Month: July 2012

The questions that policy makers may ask themselves include the following:
• What does the shadow system offer to parents and students that the regular schools do not offer, and how can regular schools expand and improve their services ?
• How do tutoring companies attract clients, and should schools also be more client-oriented ?
• How do tutoring companies attract staff, in some cases even from
regular schools, and what implications does this have for mainstream
education systems ?
• When teachers and governments claim that effective teaching and
learning cannot take place in classes of 40 or more, how is it that at
least some families and students are willing to pay for huge lecturestyle classes of star tutors in such cities as Bangkok, Colombo, and Hong Kong, China ?
• When education authorities insist that teachers must have training
to enter classrooms, how is it that many families and students are
willing to pay for the services of untrained tutors, some of whom are
themselves only university students or even secondary students?
• Why are at least some tutoring companies much more clearly at
the cutting edge of technology and curriculum development for
effective learning and teaching than schools, even in well-resourced
education systems ?
• What are the implications for fee-free education policies of the fact
that many parents across the region are clearly able and willing to pay for shadow education ?
• To what extent could mainstream schools provide the same sort
of flexibility in timing and content of teaching and learning that is
provided in the shadow ?
• What do tutors emphasize in their advertising, and what does that tell about parents’ state of mind and reasons for hiring tutors ?
• Should policy makers actively seek to manage perceptions of
mainstream schools ? (source : Asian Development Bank)